Mono on F&S Boards Version 0.2 (2020-06-16) © F&S Elektronik Systeme GmbH Untere Waldplätze 23 D-70569 Stuttgart Germany Phone: +49(0)711-123722-0 Fax: +49(0)711-123722-99 About This Document This document describes how to run .NET framework applications via Mono on F&S Boards. Remark The version number on the title page of this document is the version of the document. It is not related to the version number of any software release! The latest version of this document can always be found at http://www.fs-net.de. How To Print This Document This document is designed to be printed double-sided (front and back) on A4 paper. If you want to read it with a PDF reader program, you should use a two-page layout where the title page is an extra single page. The settings are correct if the page numbers are at the outside of the pages, even pages on the left and odd pages on the right side. If it is reversed, then the title page is handled wrongly and is part of the first double-page instead of a single page. Titlepage 8 9 Typographical Conventions We use different fonts and highlighting to emphasize the context of special terms: File names Menu entries Board input/output Program code PC input/output Listings Generic input/output Variables History Date V Platform A,M,R Chapter Description Au 2020-05-18 0.1 ALL A ALL Initial version PG 2020-06-09 0.2 ALL M ALL Correct typos and footer PG 2020-06-09 0.2 ALL A 2 Add System requirements chapter PG 2020-06-09 0.2 ALL M 8 Add GTK# tutorial directly into this document PG V Version A,M,R Added, Modified, Removed Au Author Mono on F&S Boardsv Mono on F&S Boards vi Table of Contents 1 Introduction 1 2 System requirements 2 3 Tested Software versions 3 4 Compiling the Mono images 4 4.1 Compiling the Mono images with Buildroot .........................................................4 4.2 Compiling the Mono images with Yocto ..............................................................5 5 Executing .NET applications on F&S boards using Mono 6 5.1 Running an application ........................................................................................6 5.2 Handling possible failures....................................................................................6 5.2.1 Missing entry in the DllMap .................................................................................6 5.2.2 Missing .so library................................................................................................7 5.2.3 Missing .dll library ................................................................................................8 6 Using Visual Studios to remote debug Mono apps on F&S Boards 9 6.1 Installing MonoRemoteDebugger ........................................................................9 6.2 Using MonoRemoteDebugger .............................................................................9 6.3 Known issues ....................................................................................................10 7 Executing Xamarin applications on F&S boards using Mono 11 8 Appendix 12 8.1 Add GTK# to Xamarin projects..........................................................................12 9 Important Notice 20 Mono on F&S Boards vii Introduction 1 Introduction This document describes how to run .Net framework application to F&S-Linux boards, using the Mono framework. Mono is an open source implementation of the .Net framework, sponsored by Microsoft. It currently supports most of the .NET libraries up to version 4.7 except WPF, WWF, and with limited WCF and limited ASP.NET async stack. For detailed compatibility information please see the official website of the mono project. https://www.mono-project.com/docs/about-mono/compatibility/ https://www.mono-project.com/docs/getting-started/application-portability/ Please notice, that there are no native libraries to access Linux hardware peripheries like I2C or SPI in Mono. If you need to access these in your application, please contact F&S for support to create these libraries. This document assumes basic knowledge of using Linux on F&S boards. For a detailed introduction please see the Linux on F&S Boards.pdf from the document section of your F&S board at https://www.fs-net.de/ Mono on F&S Boards1 System requirements 2 System requirements The mono rootfs images need a lot of disk space, so make sure your flash memory is big enough: Buildroot Image type Image size Ubifs Image (Nand Flash) 210 MB Ext4 Image (eMMC) 480 MB Yocto Image type Image size Ubifs Image (Nand Flash) 210 MB Ext4 Image (eMMC) 520 MB Mono on F&S Boards2 Tested Software versions 3 Tested Software versions The Software used in this document has been tested with the following versions. Software Version Development Machine F_S_Development_Machine- Fedora_27_V1.2 Buildroot fsimx6 fsimx6-B2020.04 Yocto fsimx6 fsimx6-Y2020.03 fsimx8mm fsimx8mm-Y2020.05 Microsoft Visual Studio Community 2019 Version 16.5.4 MonoRemoteDebugger 1.5.2 Mono on F&S Boards3 Compiling the Mono images 4 Compiling the Mono images F&S supports the build environments Buildroot and Yocto to build the system software. This chapter describes how to build a root filesystem with preinstalled Mono binaries, using Buildroot or Yocto. For a detailed description how to setup and use the build environments, please see the document Linux on F&S Boards chapter Compiling the System Software. Please note that Buildroot currently only supports Mono for fsimx6/7-Boards. For fsimx8m/mm-Boards use Yocto. 4.1 Compiling the Mono images with Buildroot 1. Get the latest F&S-Buildroot release and execute the setup-buildroot script to install Buildroot to your development machine. Follow the instructions. 2. Build the standard defconfig of your machine. Run make fs<YOUR_MACHINE>_std_defconfig in your Buildroot main directory. 3. Open the configuration menu in your buildroot directory make menuconfig 4. Activate the mono package at Target packages -> Interpreter languages and scripting-> mono if you are using a GUI also activate libgdiplus Target packages -> Libraries -> Graphics -> libgdiplus 5. Mono needs about 170MB of disk space, so the rootfile system may get too large for .ext image. You can increase the .ext image size by setting Filesystem images -> ext2/3/4 root filesystem -> exact size in the configuration menu to at least 400000 6. Build buildroot make –j4 7. The build output can be found at output/images/ Mono on F&S Boards4 Compiling the Mono images 4.2 Compiling the Mono images with Yocto 1. Get the latest F&S- Yocto release and execute the setup-yocto script to install Yocto to your development machine. Follow the instructions. 2. Setup the build environment for your machine. Fsimx8 boards need a different DISTRO than fsimx6/7 boards, so please run the respective command in the main directory of your Yocto installation. Fsimx6/7 DISTRO=fus-imx-x11 MACHINE=<YOUR_MACHINE> . fus-setup- release.sh Fsimx8 DISTRO=fus-imx-xwayland MACHINE=<YOUR_MACHINE> . fus-setup- release.sh 3. Now run bitbake fus-image-mono to compile the images. 4. The build output can be found at tmp/deploy/images/<YOUR_MACHINE>/ Mono on F&S Boards5 Executing .NET applications on F&S boards using Mono 5 Executing .NET applications on F&S boards using Mono This chapter describes how to execute .NET applications on F&S boards and how to handle possible failures. 5.1 Running an application 1. Install the Mono images to your board. You will need to install kernel, device tree and root filesystem. The different ways of how to install the images are described in the document Linux on F&S Boards chapters Image Download and Image Storage. 2. Boot Linux and transfer your .NET application to the board. You can transfer it via network using the tftp command or use an USB stick. See Linux on F&S Boards chapter Using the Standard System and Devices. 3. Execute the .NET application using mono </path/to/your/application.exe> 5.2 Handling possible failures Depending on your application you may get error messages for missing libraries, e.g.: System.DllNotFoundException: libcairo-2.dll This might have several reasons. 5.2.1 Missing entry in the DllMap Mono uses DllMaps to map Windows library names (.dll) to Linux library names (.so). The DllMaps are specified either in the global mono configuration file at /etc/mono/config Or at the assembly configuration file of your application at <App_Name>.exe.config A DllMaps entry looks like this: <configuration> … <dllmap dll="<DLL_NAME>" target="<SO_NAME>" os="<OS>"/> … </configuration> Mono on F&S Boards6 Executing .NET applications on F&S boards using Mono with DLL_NAME = Name of the .dll needed by the application SO_NAME = Name of the .so library, the dll is mapped to. Mono checks the paths /lib/ and /usr/lib/ for <SO_NAME>. OS = Name of the operating system for which the mapping should be applied (e.g. linux, windows, osx...) To check for a missing entry in the DllMap open the config file and look for the DLL_NAME vi /etc/mono/config If there is no exact entry for the missing .dll you can try to add one. First make sure your rootfs is mounted read-writeable mount –o remount,rw / Then open the config again and add a new entry, for example: <dllmap dll="libcairo-2.dll " target="libcairo.so.2" os="linux"/> To get the name of the respective Linux library you can search the paths /lib/ and /usr/lib. find /lib /usr/lib -name "libcairo*" 5.2.2 Missing .so library Sometimes the DllMap entry is just slightly different from the name of the installed library (for example libcairo.so.2.0 instead of libcairo.so.2). Just add a new entry with the correct names to the config file. If you cannot find a fitting .so-library for your needed .dll, you may have to install it first to your root filesystem. How to do this depends on your build environment. Buildroot 1. Open the configuration menu make menuconfig 2. Type “/” to search for a package. If you find it, activate it, save and exit.